Open Day 2013

Our inaugural Open Day last Saturday was enormously successful.  Our main objectives were to connect with the community and to raise funds to continue our work, and we have achieved both!

I popped around before the doors were open to take some photos.

Firstly, the meeters and greeters, Maureen, Nikki and Barb, ready to take admissions and sell raffle tickets.  The first prize is a choice of the lovely Irish Chain quilt or the beautiful woven blanket on the end of the table. A difficult choice.

 

Step inside and to the left and here's a long view of the church.  The quilts over the pews are Sunshine Linus donation quilts, while those hanging are the personal precious quilts of some of our members. 

Liz and Thelma discussing strategy

 

Looking back from the church through the vestibule to the meeting hall. 

 

The sales tables are groaning with goodies. 

Lee is waiting for customers - it won't be long now!

Quilts, toys, bags, scarves and so much more; it's hard to know what to buy!

 

But there's more! Cushions and owls and more quilts!

 

Rosemary has been bundling pre-loved craft magazines for sale, and is also raffling the delightful knitted clown.

 

Inside the meeting hall are displays of some of the items made and distributed by Sunshine Linus.

 

Blankets of love and tiny robes for babies, knitted jumpers, beanies and toys, children's pyjamas, adult bibs for nursing home residents, weighted blankets and vests for special schools, zippered bags for toiletries, bags for carrying xrays, and bright busy bags for foster children.

Touchy feely quilts and aprons, knitted slipper socks, drainage bags for oncology units, scarves, rice bags to stimulate Alzheimer's patients, and quilted, crocheted and knitted lap rugs.

 

Along a bit further here's Bev S at the demonstration table.

Bev's sewing some bags and chatting with our visitors.

 

Also, in the meeting hall are the vendor stalls.

Here's Penny from Patchwork Angel.

 

Robyn and Chris from Bowerbirdy.

Julie from Nimble Stitches

 

And Kim and her helper from Kimz Sewing and Patchwork.

 

The doors are open and our salesladies are being kept very busy.

 

And then a lovely Devonshire tea, aaah.

The ladies in the kitchen did a fabulous job of keeping up with the hungry hordes.

 

There was an enormous amount of work being done behind the scenes and our grateful thanks go to all the husbands and family and friends who came to help out.

 

There will be another post shortly with news of the winners of the lovely raffles.

  

 



12th August 2013

Yvonne made this beauty.
It will be available for sale on our special day.

We had an extra gathering today, in preparation for our Open Day and Quilt Show on the 31st August.  We spent the day with a show and tell, then collecting and counting and organising distribution and finally we sat down at lunchtime and fine tuned the arrangements for our special day.

We are getting excited to be throwing open the doors and inviting everyone to come and see what we do and where it all goes, around the Sunshine Coast community.

Our Handcrafted gifts table is full to overflowing with spectacularly clever and beautifully made items for purchase by our visitors. 

I know it's not Christmas yet, but it might be an opportunity to gather a few gifts together in preparation for the coming Christmas season!


 

Claire has been making the most wonderful bags for our Open Day.  The fabric she has used would ordinarily be used for curtaining, but Claire has a wonderfully creative skill and makes this fabric into the most delightful bags.

We had three new members join us today.  Hello to Moira, Lyn & Sue.  Lyn had been in touch with Sunshine Linus about the lovely little outfits she has put together. 

These sweet little ensembles are a crocheted vest (by Lyn) and purchased little tops and bottoms to complete the outfit.  We were blown away with the volume of outfits and the quality of the clothing. 

These items were distributed to a local women's refuge where they'll be very much appreciated.  We also distributed two huge bags of new toys that Lyn had collected, and these were taken to Chris Potter and the Gifts for Kids in Care organisation, who support foster children on the coast.

We are developing a very large clientele these days, and are starting to enter into some very close partnerships with various organisation who benefit from our busy hands and generous hearts.

SANDS(Miscarriage, Stillborn and newborn death support group,  http://www.sands.org.au/ is one such organisation that is working with us to provide specific little items to their members including little delicate gowns and blankets of love.  There'll be more on that subject next time.

Here's some more photos of the goodies that arrived yesterday, and went on to be distributed before we left.

We would also like to thank Kay Sauer at APatchy Quilting for donating the fabrics shown here for Sunshine Linus.  We simply couldn't do what we do without the generosity of other quilters and quilt business owners.  Thank you Kay, it is most appreciated.

A friend of Claires also donated these beautiful items - a very pretty quilt and a knitted rug.  Aren't they just beautiful?  Thankyou Claires friend. Your work is lovely.



 

July

It was lovely to see so many new faces at our meeting this month, and we hope to see them back again in the future.

Our meetings are always very busy affairs with lots of news and exchanges of ideas and patterns and techniques; there's always something going on - and mostly all at the same time.  I have to admit that it can be a bit overwhelming at times!

Once again, there was masses of "product" brought in. 

 

This sweet little memory blanket has a tatted cross in the centre.

 

Claire, on the left, made these, and many more, touchy feely items, among a host of other things.  Very busy girl, our Claire!

 

Clever Orrawin was handed this small hexagon centrepiece and turned it into a lovely quilt.

 

These crochet rugs were sent to us from Alisa, Dagmar and Anne.

 

A fun quilt for a lucky child.

 

String Star - no waste here!

 

Fishy I Spy

 

Plaid Stars

 

A lovely bouquet!

 

Beautifully knitted items

 

There's a lot of love in this quilt!

 

Crocheted items from the IRT Retirement Village crafty ladies

 

 

This large quilt was made and donated by Irene Joyce, from Beerwah.

We are giving it to Lions Tewantin/Noosa to be raffled at a Community Fun Day on October 13th in Gympie Terrace, Noosaville.  The proceeds will help support Wesley House, who provide high care for young people.
 



 

 

JAKES QUILT

From time to time we are asked to make a quilt for a special person, and that's what we've done for Jake, the son of a friend of Sunshine Linus.  Jake loves plaids and so this quilt was created just for him.  It's a biggy! because Jake is an adult and sleeps in a queen size bed.  Judie B made this quilt and we're sure that Jake and his parents are going to be very pleased with it.  Jakes parents will make a donation to Sunshine Linus to show their appreciation and thanks.

 

Preparations for the Open Day on August 31st are continuing apace, and it looks like the Sales Tables will be groaning.  There will be masses of lovely stuff for sale, and lots of bargains, so be sure not to miss out.

An extra gathering has been scheduled for August 12th.  See you there...............

Some of our Sunshine Linus members have been involved in making Aussie Hero Quilts for our servicemen and women who are serving overseas - particularly in Afghanistan and as Peace Keepers elsewhere around the world. 

This week we received this email from Aussie Hero Quilts administration, who had received an email from Julius, a soldier who receive a quilt that Sunshine Linus contributed to.  Have a look:

Here's what Julius said:

Hey ladies,

 

I received your amazing quilt. It's great :) Thank you so much for having this service for the soldiers overseas!

 

Kind regards

 

Julius

What a buzz!

Monday 24th June - Happy Birthday to us!!
We celebrated our third birthday at our gathering in June.  After only three years in operation, we have achieved enormous success in providing quilts and other comforts free to our community here on the Sunshine Coast.  If you'd like to see what we've made and where it's gone, click on the prompt at the right side of this screen. 

Our VP Ann made the most scrumptious cakes and we sang happy birthday to ourselves.  We had intended to play some games and have a bit of frivolity, but we just didn't have the time.  That's not to say we didn't get up to mischief - we seem to be able to do that without thinking!! Lots of giggling and chatting is the order of the day, while our hands are busy sorting, counting and packing and stitching, stitching and stitching.

There is just so much going on at Sunshine Linus.  Every monthly gathering sees another haul of wonderfully hand made items that have not only been made by our regular members but items that have been given to us by the crafting community to distribute for them, to those in need. 

Lately we've noticed that the centres and organisations who receive our donations are requesting us to make certain items that they need, that may not necessarily be something we're making at the present time. 

A good example of this was bought to our attention by Barb from Gympie (yes Barb travels from Gympie each month for our gathering!).  Apparently a lady at Cooinda Aged Care in Gympie contacted Barb and asked if Barb would make a bag to store the footrests that come off wheelchairs when not in use.  (These footrests are detachable to allow patients to roam freely in their wheelchairs by using their feet to propel themselves along).  The footrests need to be stored in a place nearby so they can be replaced on the wheelchairs to keep patients feet safely out of the way when being wheeled by attendants.  These bags are kept on the handles of the wheelchair, so a bag was needed for each wheelchair in the facility.  Barb made a prototype and the Occupational Therapist was very happy with the finished bag and had 12 more made for the mobile patients in the facility.  Different wheelchairs will obviously need different sized bags.  I imagine that we'll be asked to make these bags for other nursing home facilities.  It's such a great feeling knowing we can help in such practical ways.

We have a wonderful member named Joan who is the most prolific knitter I've ever come across.  We've shown a number of Joan's lovely knitted dolls on this blog in the past and here's a few more for you to enjoy.  Joan's skill is remarkable and she arrives each month with a bag full of lovely knitted goodies including dolls and items of clothing for children.  We really appreciate having Joan as a member of Sunshine Linus.  It's always wonderful to be inspired by such beautiful work.  Thankyou Joan and all the other wonderful knitters that make such precious little gifts to our community - your efforts are very much appreciated.



Our Open Day Preparations

They say "if you want something done, ask a busy person", well that rings true for us recently.  Lee is one of our members who works full time and is only able to attend gatherings during the school holidays.  But this doesn't stop her, and we always look forward to seeing her husband Tony drop in at our gatherings as he delivers the lovely quilts Lee has put together over the previous month, and of course collects more projects to keep Lee busy for another month.  Anyway, we were brain storming last month about how we can attract attention from the passing traffic, during our Open Day in August, and Lee volunteered to make some bunting.  Isn't it fabulous?  It's going to look marvellous on our special day. Thanks Lee.

We've also finally got photos of our prizes for our raffle.  We've decided that the winner can decide which prize they prefer - a beautifully crochet pure wool lap rug made by sisters Hazel and Jennifer or a Liberty Print Quilt made by Barb and quilted very skilfully by Diane Farrugia from Quilt Quest. Here's the photos for you.

Here's some more photos of some of the goodies that arrived on Monday and were distributed throughout the community the very same day.  Well done girls!

Above,  Claire is holding some knit fabric socks that we're making for the Dialysis patients at the Renal Unit at Nambour Hospital.  Patients get very cold whilst undertaking dialysis.

We are finding our Touch Feely Quilts and Aprons very popular for Alztheimers patients in nursing and care facilities, especially those patients that are mobile, but high care.  These aprons keep busy fingers occupied.

We receive donations of fabrics and other textiles for which we are most grateful.  We also often are given patchwork blocks that haven't found their way into a quilt top.  Our volunteer sewers are just terrific at putting these orphan blocks into a delightful quilt top.  We waste nothing, always finding a use for any goods that are donated to us.  We use zips for our treasure bags, curtain fabrics for our xray bags, wool for our knitters and crocheters, cording, laces and all manner of haberdashery for our Touchy Feely quilts and aprons, stuffing and batting for our stuffed toys and sit-upons, and of course beautiful patchwork fabrics (particularly children's themed fabrics) for our special quilts for children.

The red quilt was put together by Hazel and hasn't she done a lovely job.  The colour graded quilt top  is a Barb Newman "special", made with donated scraps.  Well done ladies!

 



 

What a busy month we've had.  We are getting ready for our Open Day on the 31st August and invite everyone to come and see what we do and who benefits.  Plus there'll be lots of crafted goodies for purchase as well.  See you there!